Chell

Chell in Portal 2.

“

You really are doing great... Chell. Click to listen — GLaDOS

”

Chell is the protagonist of both Portal and Portal 2. Little is known about her past beyond her being abandoned at birth and her stubborn will to live. She wields only the Handheld Portal Device throughout her entire quest for freedom.

History

Most of Chells history remains a mystery. Throughout Portal 2, GLaDOS mentions numerous times that Chell was abandoned at birth and later adopted, though the credibility of GLaDOS' word is left up to the interpreter. Many of GLaDOS' comments throughout Portal 2 and the latter stages of Portal are in an effort to belittle, annoy, or distract Chell from achieving her goal, whether or not statements of her adoption are true or not is up for debate.

In the first Portal, we are presented to Chell as just another average test subject taking part in tests of the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device and associated equipment such as Weighted Storage Cubes and Super Colliding Super Buttons. However, when instructed to accept her own death to conclude testing, Chell refuses, and begins her escape, culminating with a confrontation with GLaDOS, the sentient robot that had been first guiding, and later attempting to stop Chell from achieving her goal. While contronting GLaDOS, she removes the personality cores from her structure designed to control GLaDOS, and dampen her destructive personality. She places those cores in an incinerator chute which effectively destroys GLaDOS and part of the Aperture Science facility. She winds up on the grounds outside Aperture Science only briefly, before the Party Escort Submission robot drags Chell back into the building and is placed in indefinite statis.

In Portal 2, she awakens some time in the future to Wheatley a personality core that attempts to help her escape from the facility. During the attempted escape, the mistakenly awaken GLaDOS who quickly throws Chell back into testing for the foreseeable future. After running another series of tests while being mocked, insulted, and passive-aggressively belittled by GLaDOS, she and Wheatley manage to slip back into GLaDOS' chamber. When Wheatleys presence is detected, and GLaDOS becomes fully corrupt, a core transfer is initiated requiring Chell to press the Stalemate Associate button to initiate the transfer. Wheatley takes over the body of GLaDOS and is now in full control of the facility, but isn't quite able to handle the power.

Wheatley quickly turns on Chell and tosses her down an elevator shaft where she, and GLaDOS who has now been inserted into a potato battery, bottom out in the remains of Aperture Sciences older test chambers. Though broken down and deteriorated, many of the tests and testing elements remain intact. Chell begins to head towards the facility in an effort to find a way back to the newer Aperture Science facility, guided by recordings of the now deceased founder of Aperture Science Cave Johnson, she navigates test chambers from the 1950s, 70s, and 80's, before finally finding a way back into the primary facility. Now with GLaDOS in her potato attached to Chells portal gun, they begin their quest to reinsert GLaDOS into her body to stop Wheatley from destroying the entire facility.

Gallery

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  Chell first-person view.

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  Chell in Portal.

Trivia

• One of the Bring Your Daughter to Work Day science-fair entries within Portal 2 is signed, "by Chell"; indicating Chell was the daughter of an Aperture Science employee. However there is no confirmed connection between this and the playable-character Chell. The entry seemingly began as a potato, interacting with "an element from daddys work" and has now grown massively out of control and taken up roots in the structure.
• The turret opera at the end of Portal 2 mentions Chell by name, calling her "cara mia" – "my dear" in Italian. This implies a deeper connection between Chell and GLaDOS than was previously let on.
• Chells file represented in the Lab Rat comic indicates an unusually high level of tenacity. Nothing that she "never gives up. Ever", her file was ultimately stamped "Do Not Test".
• Chells last name remains a mystery, in the Aperture Science directory, her last name has been officially redacted from the Aperture Science computer system, thus keeping it hidden from both the player, as well as GLaDOS. This has lead to some speculation that Chell may be the daughter of Cave Johnson and his secretary/assistant Caroline. This notion is highly theoretical with many contradictory facts presented by disbelievers of this theory.